A bleak, bleak night in Christchurch, with foul weather overhead merely a precursor to grim conditions now in the heart of the Lions camp. Rain and sleet from the sky have frozen into icy shards stabbing into the career of Sir Clive Woodward.

He wanted this so badly to be the best prepared Lions team ever. Instead, his team gave every impression of having walked on to the field as complete strangers. In fact, had they only met each other for the very first time half an hour before kick-off it is hard to imagine them playing any worse than they managed in the first Test.

They were overwhelmed by a side that played well. But this was a story of a touring side that played appallingly.

Where to begin? With, I suppose, the one element over which the Lions could have no control: their injuries. Richard Hill's third tour is over, his knee damaged beyond immediate repair. He is joined on the list of those who will play no further part by Tom Shanklin, whose own knee flared up after the midweek game in Invercargill.

But the worst injury was the dislocated shoulder suffered by tour captain Brian O'Driscoll. It came all of 90 seconds into the game, when it is more or less fair to say the Lions were still in the hunt. Soon after he was carried from the field, however, it was clear what the result would be.

The departure had an immediate effect on the team. They began to fall apart. But the longer-term repercussions are just as important. The captain, obviously, is out of the tour, but it was precisely how he was hurt that became the intrigue as a long night's soul searching and video analysis began.

As midnight approached, local time, Sir Clive reappeared before the media to inform us that he was initiating citing procedures against All Black hooker Keven Mealamu and their captain and inside centre Tana Umaga.

After a ruck was over, and the ball well clear, Woodward said that the two New Zealanders grabbed a leg apiece of O'Driscoll, picked him off the ground and speared him head first back into it.

By 3.00am the story had changed. Mealamu and Umaga would not be pursued by independent citing commissioner, Willem Venter, of South Africa. But Danny Grewcock would be, for an alleged bite on Mealamu in the 63rd minute.

This was a messy post-match affair. Grewcock in NZ trouble: it's hardly news, the second row having been sent off here on the Tour of Hell in 1998. But biting is a serious offence where punishments are meted out in months not weeks. Apparently the Lions are not toothless after all.

It all came as a macabre conclusion to a gothic horror-show on the field. Seriously good rugby players were left floundering.

People like Dwayne Peel, in the form of his life for Wales in the Six Nations, were left knocking on while attempting to tap and go. Josh Lewsey, the most uncompromising warrior in the game was left in a heap.

But nothing was as bad as the line-out. The whole premise for opting for a game-plan of limited width and imagination was that the Lions forwards would emerge marginally on top in a ferocious engagement with the All Black pack.

You win the better ball going forward, you kick, you chase, you maintain a line that falls upon the foe and turns ball over or forces a mistake, and then you strike, either by hand or, more likely, through the place-kicking boot of Jonny Wilkinson.

It wasn't exactly going to be glamorous but it might just have worked. As long, that is, as the Lions forwards kept their part of the bargain, and gained the edge up front.

They didn't. From the very first throw into the line-out it was clear the basic set-piece was a shambles. On at least three occasions the Lions forwards failed to get a single jumper into the air. When Ali Williams pounced for his try on a throw going precisely nowhere, there were three groups of Lions forwards doing three sets of different line-out jobs, all of them wrong.

The line-out was no worse when the Lions were down to seven forwards, with Paul O'Connell in the bin. In fact, no sooner had the second row returned than Williams was surging away for his try. As the game wore on, the line-out grew only worse. Shane Byrne ceded his place to Steve Thompson, who also missed his targets. It was a dispiriting display of confusion and imprecision.

The All Blacks, recipients of so much bonus ball - 10 takes on the Lions throw - could purr into action. Their fluency outside the forwards is never in doubt if the supply of possession is smooth. This was honeyed, and confidence accordingly rose in all areas.

The pack, aware that the line-out, for example, was exceeding expectations, began to explore points of weakness at the scrummage. And, again, came away with plus marks. If they didn't shove the scrum all over the park, they certainly sent it at will in circles. The Lions were literally in a spin. And that was in the zones of play where they thought they might do well.

Faced by the All Black three-quarters, without O'Driscoll, and on the back foot, it was always going to embarrassing out in midfield if plan A went awry. The New Zealanders played with intuition and athleticism and efficiency; the Lions hesitated, went sideways and then sliced the ball anywhere.

Poor old Jason Robinson. Where once he darted and ducked, now he stuttered and was plucked by tacklers who fell for none of the old tricks. He began to kick the ball, which is not a pretty sight.

What was he doing playing at full-back? We thought Woodward might have seen something not apparent to the rest of us, but it seems he has missed the fact that Robinson is way out of sorts.

Robinson wasn't the only poor kicker. Nothing the Lions sent downfield was dispatched with authority. The punts were born of a startled realisation that attacks by hand were going nowhere. The pack was going backwards, the backs were going sideways and the only thing left to do was get rid of the damn ball by boot.

Strangely enough, the All Black kicking game wasn't too hot either. At least 10 kicks by Aaron Mauger - what a game he had - Leon MacDonald or the sensational Dan Carter were either fully or partially charged down. But on a night such as this, when the flow of possession was all one way, good fortune went the same way.

Not one of the charged-down kicks led to any trouble for the home team. In fact, on more than one occasion the bouncing ball sat up kindly for them to re-launch an attack with even greater velocity and vigour. On such a night, everything went the way of the All Blacks.

Surely they cannot enjoy such good fortune again. Surely the Lions forwards cannot be quite so hapless again. Surely the game-plan must be to be a little more adventurous in attack.

Changes have to be made. There are holes to fill and gaps to plug and confidences to bolster. New faces are urgently needed. A new approach is urgently required. But how do you recover from such a going-over, when history shows that the All Blacks only grow stronger and stronger as the series goes on?

Woodward had us believe he could win by doing things the old way: old England with an old song-sheet. Now, in his final move in the game of rugby union, he has to show that he can react fast, change quickly and push back new frontiers. If this tour was always going to be a massive challenge, it has suddenly become a mission impossible.

And Sir Clive's final fanfare threatens to be the sound of tumbleweed born on an icy wind.